Where do I begin? It’s been four and a half years since I published my memoir. Emily and I are well both mentally and physically although Emily has been through another battle with cancer. 

Fortunately, the cancers they found were not recurrences, which tend to be resistant to treatment, but two new tumors, one in each breast. She was an incredible warrior going through another four months of chemo, a double mastectomy and reconstruction. I did the best I could to support her but was struggling with my own internal turmoil. More on that later, in another post. 

Miraculously, she had a PCR or pathologically complete response to the chemo, meaning they didn’t find any cancer cells in the breast tissue they removed. Emily retired from teaching kindergarten after four months of teaching under COVID restrictions. Two weeks later she was hit with the cancer diagnosis. In a way it was lucky it happened that way, because she could devote all her energy to survival.

Now that she is through treatment and her prognosis is good, Emily has begun enjoying her retirement. She has a group of walking buddies who call themselves the Strawberry Hill Gang (SHG). Strawberry Hill is the nickname for this neighborhood which had very rich soil that was good for growing strawberries.

The SHG is an amazing group of women ages 66-86 who are all very active socially and politically. Some are master gardeners, others have razor sharp intellects and are passionate about the community and world. Many like Emily love to travel. In fact, Emily is planning a week-long trip to Aruba with two of the women. Most importantly, they support each other in every way imaginable. I luckily am an honorary member of the group.

What have I been up to? Well, I’m going on my eleventh year working as a research technician II in the same lab I was at the end of my memoir. I still love my job and my line of work. It’s challenging and I feel like I am contributing to medical science which ultimately is about saving lives.

After I published my memoir, for a while I bathed in the satisfaction of having completed the project. I also gave my recovery story for the NAMI Speaker Series, and Emily and I both presented in a webinar for McClean Hospital. I tracked my book sales on Amazon and was delighted by each sale and even more so by the reviews readers left on Amazon.com, but soon sales all but stopped, and I was faced with the daunting task of promoting my memoir. I believed I had written something honest and inspiring that could motivate people in recovery to step out of their comfort zone and reach for their dreams.

As a first-time author with a demanding job, who also needed to keep his memoir a secret at work, I really struggled with the promotion piece. It took a while to figure out how to set up an email under my pen name and much more time to learn WordPress that I used to create this author website. But, the website hasn’t helped me sell the book very much. On the contrary, now I need to learn how to promote my website. I take heart in the fact that nothing worthwhile is easy.

Lisanne Finston, the director of Gould Farm, offered to sell my memoir at Gould Farm’s Roadside Store, which had just been completely renovated and was serving the public. She asked for ten copies and then for fifteen more! They sell for the same $7.99 that they sell on Amazon and, either way, Gould Farm gets to keep half the profits.

The latest bit of promotion was convincing a bookstore to carry it on consignment. I sent them an email, then followed up with a phone call. Finally, I perfected an elevator pitch and went to the store to ask them in person, only to be told they weren’t accepting any more books until September (this was in March). Unwilling to give up entirely, I found the psychology and self-help section and perused the books. On my way out I smiled at the lady I’d been talking with and said, “You have a great psychology and self-help section. Maybe one day my book will be there.” She smiled back and said, “Yes.”

The next day I crafted a compelling follow-up pitch and emailed it to her. She replied the next day with a link to their consignment application and said I should submit my memoir. I did and in another two weeks, I got an email asking for two copies that they would put on their shelves. Woohoo!

I hope to post again soon. In the meantime, remember, don’t give up!